PSF Meeting Minutes for 2006-10-09

A regular meeting of the Python Software Foundation ("PSF") Board of
Directors was held over Internet Relay Chat beginning at 17:05 UTC, 9
October 2006. Stephan Deibel presided at the meeting. David Goodger
prepared these minutes.

The following members of the Board of Directors were present at the
meeting: Tim Peters, David Goodger, Stephan Deibel, Andrew Kuchling,
Martin von Löwis, and Brett Cannon. Also in attendance were Kurt
Kaiser (Treasurer) and Neal Norwitz (Assistant Treasurer).

The following are action items carried forward from the 18 September 2006
meeting, as highlighted in the minutes (Section 3, Status of Past
Action Items):

Originally from October 2005, Section 4, Public Support Committee:
D. Goodger will pursue web page and installer donation
link ideas.

Status: carried forward.

Originally from October 2005, Section 5, Ubuntu Development
Meeting: Add "swag for events" to future agenda
[D. Goodger].

Status: carried forward.

Originally from November 2005, follow-up from December 2005:
D. Goodger is to contact a potential PSF sponsor/donor.

The potential sponsor's representative has secured senior
management agreement and continues to work on a sponsor
application.

Status: follow-up required.

Originally from November 2005, follow-up from December 2005:
S. Holden is to contact a potential PSF sponsor/donor.

S. Holden reported by email that there has been no response to his
enquiries yet.

Status: follow-up required.

Originally from November 2005, Section 8, Trademark Policy:
S. Deibel to work on the PSF trademark policy, and discuss
with Heather Meeker. (Note, name changed to new lawyer.)

S. Deibel reports that we have a reviewed draft but need another
revision. He will follow up with Heather Meeker.

Status: follow-up required.

Originally from March 2006, Section 4, Grants Committee:
M. von Löwis agreed to draft a report on the PSF grants.

Status: carried forward.

Originally from June 2006, Section 6, PSF Records: The
Board agreed to assemble the existing records in one place, have
them scanned, and enter them into the PSF data repository.
D. Goodger will coordinate this work and maintain the records.

Status: in progress.

Originally from July 2006, Section 3.2, item 3: D. Goodger
will update & confirm email & snail mail addresses when he receives
the PSF records, with the help of M. von Löwis.

Status: carried forward.

Originally from July 2006, Section 9, 2006 Budget & Action Plan:
D. Goodger will develop the 2006 Budget & Action Plan
further and take it to the PSF membership for feedback.

Status: carried forward.

Originally from August 2006, Section 3.3, item 4: S. Deibel to
follow up with our lawyer regarding the trademark agreement from
Autodesk.

Status: done.

Originally from August 2006, Section 10: T. Peters will
ask the advice of Larry Rosen regarding concerns with the
contributor agreement.

T. Peters asked whether the board still wants him to talk with
Larry Rosen about this, or switch to Heather Meeker. The board
agreed that we should ask Larry Rosen first.

S. Deibel noted that he wants to encourage Jeff to get past the
initial setup and announcement. D. Goodger agreed, remarking: "I'd
like to see more details about what's being done, like deliverables
being worked on."

The Infrastructure Committee got together and came to a tie
between Roundup and JIRA in terms of tracker abilities. But
Atlassian sweetened the deal by offering us very good, free
hosting; this tipped the scales in JIRA's favour.

We announced this, but said Roundup could become our
recommendation if enough people volunteered. While
comp.lang.python had a flame war, several people volunteered.
With A. Kuchling's and M. von Löwis' confirmation I am happy to
say we have enough Roundup volunteers to go with it.

We have also had an offer for professional Roundup hosting [from
Upfront Systems, free of charge]. Either way I am going to
announce on my blog that Roundup has been accepted, but wait until
we decided between the pro hosting and us hosting it for an
official announcement. Also waiting for last-minute volunteers to
roll in.

S. Deibel asked what the volunteers need to do. B. Cannon replied
that volunteers are needed to help setup and maintain the
installation. M. von Löwis elaborated:

I expect that users will complain about Roundup, and that many of
these complaints can be responded to with little effort. You just
need some experienced Python hacker to add a button here and
change the color there.

Later, we will need people to look after it when it goes down
(which it will, one day or another).

Eventually, some of the volunteers will run away; those left will
hopefully train their successors.

D. Goodger asked if professional hosting was even worth considering;
"won't that just start another flame war?" B. Cannon: "I really don't
think the pro hosting will be an issue; the flame war was over using a
closed source solution."

B. Cannon will be posting details of the hosting offer to the
infrastructure mailing list when he gets it.

B. Cannon: "And I have to say I have been quite happy with the
community mostly sticking up for the committee."